Single line printers of the drum and hammer type are well known. In these printers, characters are arranged around the periphery of the drum, or type wheel, which is rotated in a manner to pass the characters individually past a print station wherein a print hammer is actuated selectively to print individual characters on a print receiving form which is indexed step by step through the print station column by column, along with a ribbon, to print selected characters on a single line on the form while the form is stationary. To print additional lines of characters, the form must by necessity be indexed in a manner to present each additional line thereof for printing, while the form is stationary, and the form indexed again, column by column, through the print station for each line to be printed.
The disadvantage of the above described printers is in the time consumed for indexing the form column by column during the printing of a line of characters and line by line to print additional lines.